Will the 201213 U.S. Supreme Court term be as record-breaking as the last one? Patricia Millett, head of Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld’s Supreme Court practice, hopes so. She is advising Governor Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island; he opposes the death penalty and is refusing to turn over an inmate facing federal capital charges. Millett is petitioning the court on the governor’s behalf. If the court grants a hearing on the novel case, Millett will also get to hit another milestone: extending her record for the most Supreme Court oral arguments by a womana record she set last April, when she argued her 31st case before the high court. Millett, who spent nearly a decade as an assistant to the solicitor general of the United States before joining Akin Gump in 2007, most recently represented a Potawatomi Indian tribe in Michigan before the court last spring. (She lost.) Millett spoke to staff reporter Victor Li about her practice and her preargument rituals.
VL: Congratulations on setting the record for most oral arguments before the Supreme Court for a woman. How does it feel?
